PERSONAL FINANCE NEWS
NO OVERSEAS FX FEES WITH KALIXA
Whether you are heading to South Africa for the World Cup or elsewhere this summer, you ought to be thinking about your currency arrangements as early as possible. Kalixa, the pre-paid Mastercard, has announced this week that it will be waiving its standard foreign exchange fee for all point-of-sale transactions made abroad. The offer started earlier this week and it will run until 30 September 2010. The Kalixa card can be loaded with up to £3,000 by electronic bank transfer for 99p or from another debit or credit card at 1.95 per cent.
NEW BARCLAYS’ GROWTHBUILDER
Barclays Wealth has launched a new version of its Growthbuilder investment product, which aims to deliver a competitive rate of return in low growth market conditions. The six-year Growthbuilder offers a 6.6 per cent locked-in return for each year that the FTSE 100 is at or above its starting level on any of the plan’s six anniversaries. The potential maximum is therefore 39.6 per cent. Investors’ capital is fully returned at maturity, irrespective of market performance. The maturity date of the product is 18 August 2016 and the minimum investment is £5,100.
TOP 10 MOST USELESS PRODUCTS
People could be wasting thousands of pounds on financial products that they don’t need according to research from Which? Money Quarterly out today. It said that the top 10 most useless products are mobile phone insurance, extended warranties, structured products, ID fraud cover, payment protection insurance, secured loans, store cards, debt management plans, with-profits products such as endowments, and packaged accounts. Which? Money said that these products are often useless and may be covered by another product that you already own.